Project Summary

Concept

THUNDER aims at developing sustainable waste heat recovery and seasonal storage solutions available to data centres in urban environments, in order to supply heat to neighbouring district heating networks and at the same time providing a cooling /service to the data centres. Thermochemical material (TCM) based storages are targeted. The storage technology is innovative and the materials are selected to increase the storage capacity, by enhanced heat and mass transfer processes and near-zero thermal losses. In combination with thermal upgrade devices (such as high-temperature heat pumps), these storage systems, based on chemical reactions and sorption processes, provide a next-generation efficient and compact storage solution able to exploit the low-grade quality waste thermal fluxes from data centres. In this concept, waste heat from data is accumulated during summertime, stored and released into the district heating network during the winter period.

The effectiveness of TCM storage technology for waste heat from data centres will be assessed at the field level at the Varna Demo site (Bulgaria) in terms of environmental/economic/energetic impacts. THUNDER’s final scope is to develop an efficient waste heat recovery system from data centre to an urban district heating network. This system is based on STS strategies and innovative heat pump devices, able to efficiently transfer and store the energy flows. The combination of these technologies enhances the reuse of waste heat in an energy-efficient, sustainable and cost-effective way, overcoming the time shift between production and use, as a renewable energy source. Therefore, it opens up to new perspective, during the e summer season in urban areas, to recover energy wastes which contribute to the urban overheating, changing them from environmental loads into energy sources.

THUNDER project considers traditional (water-based) and innovative seasonal thermal storages, comparing them in terms of energy performance and economic convenience, considering different charging/discharging scenarios where the district heating network works as an energy carrier, like the smart electricity grid for renewable energy communities. The innovative seasonal thermal storage , based on thermochemical materials, characterized by high energy density and round-trip efficiency, will be developed and designed in a modular scheme to cover wide power and size ranges, suitable for locations with high space constraints. The heat pumps for the temperature modulation of the heat flows will be redesigned ad-hoc for the application in charging/discharging of the thermal storages, like the voltage transformers of an electrical grid, optimizing the system’s  energy/environmental/economic performance.

THUNDER will also deliver novel business and financial models and will promote social engagement mobilizing different stakeholders’ groups engaged in the project development value chain. The THUNDER concept will be demonstrated in real-scenario in a demonstrator in Bulgaria.

DEMO SITE

Abilix Softs data centre in Varna is located near the district heating network. It was commissioned in 2018 and since then new solutions have been developed through innovative projects aiming to reduce the environmental impacts of the data centre. Waste heatrecovery has been evaluated in 2022 and the collaboration with VEOLIA BULGARIA district heating opened up new perspectives. Varna district heating network was commissioned in 2008 and has been devoted to innovations since its start with the goal of reducing input energy consumption, as the installation of innovative monitoring and management software, which allowed a reduction of water consumption of three times and heat losses of the half, demonstrates. Veolia Energy Varna has the commitment to preserve the resources and optimize them, with this aim want to explore DC heat recovery and their use within current district heating network.